Media Pembelajaran Kelas 4 Our Classroom

The beginning of writing

By definition, the modern practice of history begins with written records; evidence of human culture without writing is the realm of prehistory.
The writing process first evolved from economic necessity in the ancient near east. Writing most likely began as a consequence of political expansion in ancient cultures, which needed reliable means for transmitting information, maintaining financial accounts, keeping historical records, and similar activities. Around the 4th millennium BC, the complexity of trade and administration outgrew the power of memory, and writing became a more dependable method of recording and presenting transactions in a permanent form.^[2] The Dispilio Tablet, which was carbon dated to the 6th millennium BC, may be evidence that writing was used even earlier than that.

Globular envelope with a cluster of accountancy tokens, Uruk period, from Susa. Louvre Museum

Archaeologist Denise Schmandt-Besserat determined the link between previously uncategorized clay "tokens" and the first known writing, Mesopotamian cuneiform.^[11] The clay tokens were used to represent commodities, and perhaps even units of time spent in labour, and their number and type became more complex as civilization advanced. A degree of complexity was reached when over a hundred different kinds of tokens had to be accounted for, and tokens were wrapped and fired in clay, with markings to indicate the kind of tokens inside. These markings soon replaced the tokens themselves, and the clay envelopes were demonstrably the prototype for clay writing tablets.^[11] In both Mesoamerica and Ancient Egypt writing may have evolved through calendrics and a political necessity for recording historical and environmental events

What's Writing ?

Writing is the representation of language in a textual medium through the use of a set of signs or symbols (known as a writing system).^[1] It is distinguished from illustration, such as cave drawing and painting, and non-symbolic preservation of language via non-textual media, such as magnetic tape audio.
Writing most likely began as a consequence of political expansion in ancient cultures, which needed reliable means for transmitting information, maintaining financial accounts, keeping historical records, and similar activities. Around the 4th millennium BC, the complexity of trade and administration in Mesopotamia outgrew human memory, and writing became a more dependable method of recording and presenting transactions in a permanent form.^[2] In both Ancient Egypt and Mesoamerica writing may have evolved through calendrics and a political necessity for recording historical and environmental events. The oldest known use of writing in China was in divination in the royal court.

Possessive Personal Pronouns

A possessive pronoun indicates that the pronoun is acting as a marker of possession and defines who owns a particular object or person. The possessive personal pronouns are "mine," "yours," "hers," "his," "its," "ours," and "theirs." Note that possessive personal pronouns are very similar to possessive adjectives like "my," "her," and "their."

In each of the following sentences, the highlighted word is a possessive personal pronoun:
The smallest gift is mine.

Here the possessive pronoun "mine" functions as a subject complement.
This is yours.

Here too the possessive pronoun "yours" functions as a subject complement.
His is on the kitchen counter.

In this example, the possessive pronoun "his" acts as the subject of the sentence.
Theirs will be delivered tomorrow.

In this sentence, the possessive pronoun "theirs" is the subject of the sentence.
Ours is the green one on the corner.

Here too the possessive pronoun "ours" function as the subject of the sentence.

What is a Pronoun?

A pronoun can replace a noun or another pronoun. You use pronouns like "he," "which," "none," and "you" to make your sentences less cumbersome and less repetitive.

Grammarians classify pronouns into several types, including the personal pronoun, the demonstrative pronoun, the interrogative pronoun, the indefinite pronoun, the relative pronoun, the reflexive pronoun, and the intensive pronoun.
Personal Pronouns

A personal pronoun refers to a specific person or thing and changes its form to indicate person, number, gender, and case.
Subjective Personal Pronouns

A subjective personal pronoun indicates that the pronoun is acting as the subject of the sentence. The subjective personal pronouns are "I," "you," "she," "he," "it," "we," "you," "they."

In the following sentences, each of the highlighted words is a subjective personal pronoun and acts as the subject of the sentence:
I was glad to find the bus pass in the bottom of the green knapsack.
You are surely the strangest child I have ever met.
He stole the selkie's skin and forced her to live with him.
When she was a young woman, she earned her living as a coal miner.
After many years, they returned to their homeland.
We will meet at the library at 3:30 p.m.
It is on the counter.
Are you the delegates from Malagawatch?
Objective Personal Pronouns

An objective personal pronoun indicates that the pronoun is acting as an object of a verb, compound verb, preposition, or infinitive phrase. The objective personal pronouns are: "me," "you," "her," "him," "it," "us," "you," and "them."

In the following sentences, each of the highlighted words is an objective personal pronoun:
Seamus stole the selkie's skin and forced her to live with him.

The objective personal pronoun "her" is the direct object of the verb "forced" and the objective personal pronoun "him" is the object of the preposition "with."
After reading the pamphlet, Judy threw it into the garbage can.

The pronoun "it" is the direct object of the verb "threw."
The agitated assistant stood up and faced the angry delegates and said, "Our leader will address you in five minutes."

In this sentence, the pronoun "you" is the direct object of the verb "address."
Deborah and Roberta will meet us at the newest café in the market.

Here the objective personal pronoun "us" is the direct object of the compound verb "will meet."
Give the list to me.

Here the objective personal pronoun "me" is the object of the preposition "to."
I'm not sure that my contact will talk to you.

Similarly in this example, the objective personal pronoun "you" is the object of the preposition "to."
Christopher was surprised to see her at the drag races.

Here the objective personal pronoun "her" is the object of the infinitive phrase "to see."

Development of grammars

Grammars evolve through usage and also due to separations of the human population. With the advent of written representations, formal rules about language usage tend to appear also. Formal grammars are codifications of usage that are developed by repeated documentation over time, and by observation as well. As the rules become established and developed, the prescriptive concept of grammatical correctness can arise. This often creates a discrepancy between contemporary usage and that which has been accepted, over time, as being correct. Linguists tend to view prescriptive grammars as having little justification beyond their authors' aesthetic tastes, although style guides may give useful advice about standard language employment, based on descriptions of usage in contemporary writings of the same language. Linguistic prescriptions also form part of the explanation for variation in speech, particularly variation in the speech of an individual speaker (an explanation, for example, for why some people say, "I didn't do nothing"; some say, "I didn't do anything"; and some say one or the other depending on social context).

The formal study of grammar is an important part of education for children from a young age through advanced learning, though the rules taught in schools are not a "grammar" in the sense most linguists use the term, particularly as they are often prescriptive rather than descriptive.

Constructed languages (also called planned languages or conlangs) are more common in the modern day. Many have been designed to aid human communication (for example, naturalistic Interlingua, schematic Esperanto, and the highly logic-compatible artificial language Lojban). Each of these languages has its own grammar.

Syntax refers to linguistic structure above the word level (e.g. how sentences are formed)—though without taking into account intonation, which is the domain of phonology. Morphology, by contrast, refers to structure at and below the word level (e.g. how compound words are formed), but above the level of individual sounds, which, like intonation, are in the domain of phonology.[8] No clear line can be drawn, however, between syntax and morphology. Analytic languages use syntax to convey information that is encoded via inflection in synthetic languages. In other words, word order is not significant and morphology is highly significant in a purely synthetic language, whereas morphology is not significant and syntax is highly significant in an analytic language. Chinese and Afrikaans, for example, are highly analytic, and meaning is therefore very context-dependent. (Both do have some inflections, and have had more in the past; thus, they are becoming even less synthetic and more "purely" analytic over time.) Latin, which is highly synthetic, uses affixes and inflections to convey the same information that Chinese does with syntax. Because Latin words are quite (though not completely) self-contained, an intelligible Latin sentence can be made from elements that are placed in a largely arbitrary order. Latin has a complex affixation and simple syntax, while Chinese has the opposite.

what's Grammar ?

The term grammar is often used by non-linguists with a very broad meaning. As Jeremy Butterfield puts it: "Grammar is often a generic way of referring to any aspect of English that people object to. However, linguists use it in a much more specific sense. Every speaker of a language has, in his or her head, a set of rules for using that language. This is a grammar, and—at least in the case of one's native language—the vast majority of the information in it is acquired not by conscious study or instruction, but by observing other speakers; much of this work is done during infancy. Language learning later in life, of course, may involve a greater degree of explicit instruction.

The term "grammar" can also be used to describe the rules that govern the linguistic behaviour of a group of speakers. The term "English grammar", therefore, may have several meanings. It may refer to the whole of English grammar—that is, to the grammars of all the speakers of the language—in which case, the term encompasses a great deal of variation. Alternatively, it may refer only to what is common to the grammars of all, or of the vast majority of English speakers (such as subject–verb–object word order in simple declarative sentences). Or it may refer to the rules of a particular, relatively well-defined variety of English (such as Standard English).

"An English grammar" is a specific description, study or analysis of such rules. A reference book describing the grammar of a language is called a "reference grammar" or simply "a grammar." A fully explicit grammar that exhaustively describes the grammatical constructions of a language is called a descriptive grammar. Linguistic description contrasts with linguistic prescription, which tries to enforce rules of how a language is to be used.

Grammatical frameworks are approaches to constructing grammars. The most known among the approaches is the traditional grammar which is traditionally taught in schools.

The standard framework of generative grammar is the transformational grammar model developed in various ways by Noam Chomsky and his associates from the 1950s onwards.